To genuinely wonder how or why anyone believes in God?

[ChaosNeverRains]

Genuine question.

I was until fairly recently I think probably agnostic rather than anything else, having been brought up in a very church oriented school where the emphasis was all on sin and retribution and the need to worship this higher being and that if you lived every day then it was through God’s will - you get the picture. Until recently though I was prepared to believe that perhaps there was a higher being out there somewhere, and even now I can see that some could believe that there is a higher being out there or that there was at some point.

But what I don’t understand is why people seem to believe that there is a God who looks over them individually when everything points to that not being the case. People talk about the power of prayer when actually no such power exists. The man dying of cancer is no more or less likely to die if you prayed for him than if you didn’t. I know of some very devout Christians who have fallen victim to the most horrific illnesses and where the church have genuinely believed that praying for them means God will heal them, which of course he hasn’t. But when they die those same people are thought to be up there eternally worshipping the lord. Why?

I can see that a belief in God might somehow make people feel comforted that this isn’t the only life we will have, but what I can’t see is that a God who allows the amount of bad and suffering that goes on in the world, even on an individual level should be so worshipped. If a father treated his children in the way that the supposed Heavenly Father treats his, no-one would want anything to do with him. Yet worshippers of a God go to all and any lengths to ensure that they continue to do things in the name of the father and to not upset him for fear of the retribution they will receive.

I’m not one for dismissing belief as believing in the fairies and what-not (with the possible exception of the dinosaur deniers,) but I am becoming more and more curious as to how it is that people can believe in this individual God and actually believe that it is true when there is no evidence to suggest anything of the sort.

PS: I am talking about any and all religion not just one. My thought process being that if there were one God it would be the same God whether you are Christian muslim or Jewish but that the scriptures are defined by humans to make for the individual religions.

I am agnostic. I would like to think there is a 'God' or at least some kind of afterlife but, in all honesty, I just do not know. I do NOT believe that religion has any place in schools or in politics. I can see that prayer can be comforting to some people but it really is just a distraction. My mother worked for highly religious people who prayed for her throughout her cancer struggle. She still died, it was still a terrible time for everyone but, hey, they felt comforted....

Limbo, if you're Catholic.

They have a special kind of hell for babies. Good of them, isn't it.

I like what Stephen Fry said.

He basically said that if there is a God he must be really fucked up to invent tiny flies that burrow into the eyes of children in the third world.

Actually the thought that God is a bit evil is worrying but it would make sense (if he existed).

I always remember a friend of my mums who who dying. As a non believer this woman was absolutely petrified of dying and put up a huge struggle. My mum said it was awful to see. In contrast to others who DID believe and went peacefully and calmly......i know which way i'd rather be.

Even if the "believer" was wrong what is there to lose. A lot less stress for the loved ones having to witness something like that if nothing else......and if loved ones feel "comforted", what on earth is wrong with that.

Atheism is a religion in the same way that not collecting stamps.

I agree with you to a point Brahumbug. But if "not stamp collecting" turns into slagging off stamp collectors and "researching" the negatives of stamp collecting in order to argue with philatelists, then it has tipped over into hobby territory.

My grandad came back from the ww2 in Burma believing in reincarnation.

He said he would either become a cat or go to hell for his sins.

He also said that everyone discovers prayer when bullets start to fly.

Atheism is a religion in the same way that not collecting stamps is a hobby.

Excellent. I hope you don't mind if I appropriate that one for future use!

Gosh, imsosceptical - there's a big debate in the university department where I teach about whether or not to put in measures to make it hard for students to skip lectures such as not putting up slides, etc. I tend to favour putting up the slides - I'd rather go carrot than stick in encouraging lecture attendance - but I don't go over the lecture in the seminar for those who didn't go as it's disrespectful of my time, and more importantly, of those who did bother to go. I know this might annoy some students, but I didn't realise they might find it 'barbaric, mean and spiteful'! Do you think in taking the refusal of one particular lecturer to help you to skip his lecture as an indictment of all organised religion it's possible, just possible, that you may have overreacted a tad?

TIRF, I think Catholicism is one of the cruellest most fucked up religions around. I could weep for my Catholic friends.

if "not stamp collecting" turns into slagging off stamp collectors - if stamp collectors started telling me I will go to hell if I don't collect stamps or refusing me services as they don't believe in those as stamp collectors, I would complan about this as a non-collector of stamps as well. Doesn't make it a religion.

Personally I will never understand how anyone remotely educated can be at all religious. I get it's sometimes comforting etc but I focus a lot on finding comfort in real life so don't feel I miss out on this.

I struggle to relate to overly religious people, I'd find it hard if any close friends were very religious.

People who know that someone is praying for them actually benefit from it.

And other people say that people who know they are being prayed for have worse rates of survival. I used to follow the atheist community and those studies were quoted a lot.

www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health/31pray.html

" And patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of post-operative complications..."

Personally I will never understand how anyone remotely educated can be at all religious.

As someone with a PhD and an academic job where a lot of my work engages with the ways in which religion shaped the work of some of the English language's greatest writers and thinkers, I think that anyone who lacks the basic understanding that someone can be clever but think differently to you must have missed a pretty basic part of education themselves.

I have friends & colleagues who are religious (Muslims, Catholics, Buddhists etc) and / or believe in woo stuff like the paranormal.

I respect their right to their beliefs so I'm careful not to say how I feel as I don't want to lose their friendship but then I'm not being true to my OWN beliefs.

“genuinely wonder why atheists think they have all the answers. I'm not in any camp but the arrogance of atheists grates on me“

Atheists don’t think they have all the answers. They just don’t believe there a god or gods. Nothing more, nothing less.

I think you make a very good point OP, and I've seen it too.

Very sick person is prayed for by the congregation, they know that God will heal them, God is merciful and kind, etc. And God loves everyone, but them in particular because they pray and He hears them.

Very sick person dies. We should be happy for very sick person, they are at rest now and with the Heavenly Father!

There is never an "Oy God, what happened to healing our mutual friend?" discussion. It's firmly ignored. A lot of people use religion like a comfort blanket - they are frightened off whatever they are frightened of and feel more powerful thinking a deity has their back, or a loved one died and they cannot cope with thinking they'll never see them again, or something awful or unfair happened to them in life and they think it must be for some divine reason. And then of course there are those who use it as a tool to control women. Not to say these are the only types of people who are religious, but I'd guess they make up a big chunk of worshippers.

Being educated doesn't mean you no longer need comfort or have all the answers.

Atheists don’t think they have all the answers. They just don’t believe there a god or gods.

Some definitely do have that arrogance. It was depressing to see YouTube's atheist community go from thoughtful discussions to baiting religious YouTubers. But they're on the same side of the coin as the arrogant religious. Both assured that they are 100% right, and the other side are 100% wrong. When there is probably not a human being on the face of the earth who actually has the answers.

A good analogy I heard regarding God not looking out for us is that he is a living father who has let us out to play in the back garden where he can keep an eye on us.
However he is not watching us all the time and is looking away when the kids start fighting or sneak out the back gate.

But if paedophiles kept climbing into my garden and raping my children and I didn't prevent it happening wouldn't the authorities take my children into care? I get that a loving parent allows their children to learn from their own mistakes, for example I've let my son forget his PE kit when I could have mentioned it.

But that's as far as the analogy goes. I will always step in if I can when he is at risk of harm. If I knew he was being groomed by a paedophile I wouldn't allow it to continue in some hopes it would teach him to be less trusting!!

Bookworm. God is not necessarily benevolent and kind. He was often harsh and terrible, particularly in the old testament, he asked Abraham to kill his own son if you remember.

Bolokov that's exactly what I'm saying.

If there is a god then he is a bit nasty.

Atheism is a religion in the same way that not collecting stamps is a hobby.

I agree there's a distinction between atheism and organised religion. But it's still a position based on faith.

Which is why no-one on this thread is going to convince anyone else that their beliefs are right and everyone else's are wrong.

But it's still a position based on faith.

Where is faith in atheism?

I was brought up Catholic and never questioned it until my early teens. It started to make less and less sense to me and as I read widely and became a feminist I started to despise the Catholic establishment's attitude to women. The single event that really helped me realise I didn't believe was when our RE teacher stood up in front of the class and said that we had to believe in heaven and an after-life because it was literally impossible for him to imagine himself dying and completely ceasing to exist. He said that no human being could imagine this and therefore this proved the existence of God and heaven. My response was that it just proved his fucking lack of imagination! The world existed just fine before me and will exist just fine when I am dead. I think it is arrogant to insist that there must be a God and a heaven because the human brain isn't able to imagine it's own non-existence!

“I agree there's a distinction between atheism and organised religion. But it's still a position based on faith.”

No it isn’t. Being a theist requires faith. Being an atheist doesn’t. Both reach the cliff that is the edge of current knowledge- and theists then make the leap of faith. Atheists stay behind with knowledge and what is understood.